Using Home Depot EcoSmart PAR20 LED Light Bulb

Today, I wanted to show you how its unique design looks installed in a recessed ceiling light fixture as well as discuss its light output.

Now, remember that this LED light will produce 8 Watts (40 Watts equivalent from a halogen light bulb) or 350 Lumens of bright white light output per the package according to the package, which is 44 Lumens per Watt.

As well, remember from yesterday my initial concerns was its appearance. I don’t like change so this was a very different look for the light bulb which initially put me off.

So, how does it look once installed in the recessed lighting outlet, also referred to by some as a pot lighting fixture?

The picture above first shows the appearance of the more traditional appearance PAR20 bulb. Compare this with the picture below where the recessed or pot lighting fixture contains the Home Depot’s EcoSmart 8 Watt PAR20 light bulb.

What do you think of the difference in the appearance? To me, its is not bad at all. I guess I was put off by the plastic around the sides of the light bulb. As well, who actually looks up at the lights in a ceiling? Sometimes I can be too detailed.

How did it perform?

Well, first here is a picture taken with no flash of the bedroom area with the 6 recessed lighting turned on first showing only with the no name 3 Watt PAR20 LED light bulbs.

Now, compare to this next picture with the 6 recessed lights on of the same room taken about 5 minutes later once I installed two of these EcoSmart 8 Watt PAR20 LED light bulbs in the recessed lighting fixtures directly over the area in the picture.

Hopefully you can see that there is indeed much more light from the pair of EcoSmart PAR20 light bulbs.

So, any lessons learned here? Yes. I wish I had not been turned of by the appearance of the EcoSmart PAR20 light bulbs. They provide much more light at 8 Watts, significantly less electricity consumption than the 50 Watt halogen lights we were using. As well, their appearance once installed is indeed fine.

Hopefully you can use our experience (and mistakes) to your own benefit. If you have the 50 Watt dimmable or non-dimmable halogen PAR20 lights installed in your recessed or pot ceiling lights, do consider investing in the 8 Watt EcoSmart LED PAR20 lights so save money now.

Comments

Thanks for sharing your experience with trying LED lights. As someone in the LED lighting industry (I work for Cree) it’s good to hear outside perspective on what people think of the different look of an LED light fixture. Sounds like once you got past that you were satisfied with your results. I also wanted to point out a product that you may or may not have seen at Home Depot. It’s called the “EcoSmart LED Downlight” and it’s made by Cree. It’s actually a 10.5 Watt recessed light that you can retrofit easily (Edison base). What you may like about it if you have more recessed lighting in your home is that it’s dimmable to 5 percent and provides warm light. Let me know if you try it out or have any questions. Thanks again for sharing your experience!
Ginny

Hi Ginny,
If I am not mistaken, that LED light bulb is meant for a larger recessed lighting fixture; i.e. one which uses a larger size bulb than a PAR20.

We have the smaller recessed lighting fixtures which use PAR20 type / size light bulbs. However, if Cree has other PAR20 LED type of light bulbs, EcoSmart or otherwise we would be interested in trying them out. We have numerous additional PAR20 halogen light bulbs remaining in our home that we need to replace with LED light bulbs. Just let me know.
Dan

Hi Ron,
Actually that is not a typo. I was trying to make the point that the different looking PAR 20 LED’s initially turned me off from using them so I made the mistake of acquiring 3 Watt Par 20′s because I was so focused on trying to save energy. Yet, I learned that the different looking PAR 20′s from Home Depot are not that different looking once installed and that they do give the amount of brightness I wanted with them being 8 Watts.

I hope that helps explain the focus of the article and that it helps others not to be put off by different light bulb designs.
Dan